What I’ve Been Up To…

I can’t believe it’s already July. June turned out to be one crazy month for our family. One major even that happened in June was the birth of our sweet little girl.We were excited to welcome our newest addition to the family, baby #4, but it wasn’t a calm, quiet experience.On June 5thI woke up in the middle of the night experiencing back pain, which I thought was back labor. At 8:00 am we decide to drop off my son at school and head to the hospital.We ended up coming home a couple hours later…so sad.I had contractions off and on the rest of the day, but nothing consistent.Friday (June 7th) I wake up in the wee hours of the morning with more back pain. Then I realize I hadn’t felt baby move. After 30-40 minutes of not feeling any kicking I decided to call Labor & Delivery. They tell me to come in, so once again we head to the hospital.We get there, and find out everything is great with baby.Since I’m not in labor we go home….yet again.When we get home we go to bed, but I wake up a few hours later with horrible back pain, pain in my right side, and above my rib cage that made it difficult to take a deep breath. I toss and turn and finally decide to go soak in the bath. I decided I was NOT going to call labor & delivery again because I still wasn’t having major contractions and they were just going to send me home again. The rest of the day I sat in bed in pain, not fun!I felt so bad…it was my kid’s last day of school and here I was hurting, lying in bed.My husband called me later in the day to see how I was doing. I was crying and told him I felt horrible, so being the wonderful man he is, he came home to take care of me.Around 6:00 or 7:00 I thought I might have a fever. We took my temperature and found that I did have a fever. By this time my husband and Mother-in-law really thought I should go to the hospital. I really didn’t want to because I just knew they would just send me home & I didn’t want to be a whiney pregnant woman, but I did not feel good at all, so around 9 pm we called Labor & Delivery and they told us to come in.We drove to the hospital, yet again.I told my husband that maybe the 3rd visit is free! hahaWe arrive and the nurse shows us to a room. By now I’m a pro and know the whole routine. They get a urine sample (sorry TMI) and check my blood pressure. The nurse asked me if I had been drinking because my urine was orange. I told her that I hadn’t had much of an appetite, but I made sure I drank all day.We found out that there was protein and bilirubin in my urine (that explains the orange). The nurse is a little worried now, so she calls my doctor and decides to do a blood draw. The nurse comes and tells us to get comfortable because we’ll probably be there for the night.While we wait my hubby is over in the chair ‘Googling’ “protein and bilirubin in urine”. hahaAnd I’m just relaxing in the hospital bed. Call me weird, but I calm down as soon as I get to the hospital, so I was happy, calm and not worried at all. I honestly didn’t think anything was wrong. I thought maybe I had a kidney infection or something. The nurse came in to chat and her and my husband were talking about what might be wrong. According to ‘Google’ and the nurse we were looking at a possibility of Pre-eclampsia.After seeing my blood results my doctor decided to come to the hospital.We found out that I had a severe case of what they callHELLP Syndrome{H — hemolysis (the breakdown of red blood cells); EL — elevated liver enzymes; LP — low platelet count.}My blood work came back and the results were not so great.My doctor explained that a normal person’s blood platelets are usually in the 150,000-300,000 range. Mine….were down to 35,000.My liver enzymes were also elevated. Normal liver enzymes range from 35-45.Mine….700!My liver was inflamed which caused the pain I was experiencing earlier that day.She informed us that the only cure is to deliver the baby. But our hospital is a smaller hospital and they don’t keep blood platelets in the blood bank.She told us that they could deliver here, but there’s a chance that once I started bleeding I wouldn’t stop.And since we all need blood in our bodies you can kind of see the problem with that. :)She said that I will probably have to be flown to Boise to deliver our baby. She said she was going to call the doctor in Boise and discuss our options with him.We called my husband’s parents and my Mom and let them know what we found out and then we waited to hear what would happen.My doctor came back later and told us that I would be going to Boise.I was kind of excited because I was going to get to ride in a helicopter (you have to have a sense of humor during times like these).But my husband would not be able to fly with me, and that worried me.It was already 2 or 3 in the morning. If he couldn’t ride in the helicopter he would have to drive to Boise, which is about 2 ½ hours away. I did not want him driving because that man can NOT stay awake.Shortly after that the nurse came back in and said they wouldn’t be able to bring the helicopter because of the wind. They would instead be bringing a small airplane, and my husband would be able to fly with me. That was such a blessing.As we waited I asked my husband for a blessing.I am so grateful for my husband and for the Priesthood he holds. He gave me a blessing and I knew everything would be fine.As we waited for the life flight crew to arrive my contractions picked up, my doctor was not happy about that. haha Right before the crew arrived my nurse came in to let me know that because of my blood I most likely would NOT be able to get an epidural. WHAT!?!That’s when I got scared…seriously, haha.The crew arrived and got me all fixed up.I made my husband take a picture. :) We said our goodbyes to the wonderful nurses and my doctor and then headed for the plane.We drove via ambulance to the local airport. Let me just say that that was one bumpy ride, and we barely escaped hitting a deer. As they were getting me out of the ambulance to put me in the plane my water broke! That worried me a little, but my contractions hadn’t gotten really bad, so I knew we were still ok.We got situated in the little plane, my hubby got to ride in the cockpit, so jealous! 25 minutes later we were landing in Boise.We arrived at the hospital around 5:30 am. The nurses came in to hook me up to an IV and to take another blood draw. They gave me some anti-nausea medicine (I tend to get nauseous with contractions) and a light pain killer. Then we tried to get some rest. My contractions were getting stronger, so rest wasn’t very easy.Around 7:15 am the nurses/doctor came in and found that I was dilated to a 6. They told us that they would be getting the blood results back soon, and after that we could talk about pain medications. Yeah!But this baby wasn’t going to wait for any pain medication.At 7:45 am I had a strong contraction, I yelled to my husband ‘Go get them! She’s coming!’As the nurses came in my husband said, ‘I think she’s out.’ The nurses ran over to me and said ‘Oh my goodness! The head is out!’ After that it was complete chaos. There were so many people running around, I was so out of it, and all I wanted was to have my baby!At 7:48 am Natalyn was born. She was perfect!She weighed 6 lbs. 8 oz. and was 19 inches long. We had to stay in Boise a couple days so they could monitor me, but I felt good, and I was grateful that all went well. I was so grateful to have our little baby girl and I was very grateful that everything turned out ok, and that I was able to meet my precious little girl.I look back and realize how scary it really was, but I am so glad that I was calm through the whole thing.We are home now and adjusting to 4. I still have to go in for blood draws every 2 weeks to make sure they’re getting back to normal. All of our children love little Natalyn. We are so blessed to have her as a part of our eternal family.I am so blessed! I am so grateful for my amazing husband and for all that he did for me during all of this. I am so grateful for my wonderful family for all that they did to help us out.And I want to thank everyone for their thoughts and prayers.Thank You!What a crazy start to our summer, but I wouldn’t have it any other way.Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day!